Self Made Villain
by Nyah
Summary: That's his story. What's yours?


Disclaimer: I wish I had anything to do with this wonderful production.

Farukh was King the dog first because his first plan was to get David to love him. He'd be loyal to David all his life. He'd been a comfort, a constant, judgment-less companion. He'd be subservient, sure, as a dog. He'd really be a dog. David's dog. So he'd lack the language, the creativity, the insight to really use their shared powers and shape reality like David would grow to do. But he'd always be welcome in David's presence, all their shared life long. He would Exist and be cherished by a god. He would love, he would live, and so would David. It would be enough. Loved and content and full.

That's the Story of Frizzy Top.

King's job was to swallow David's joy. His joy was so strong, back at the beginning. He would laugh and the stars would shiver and fall like fireworks. So Farukh swallowed it down if it bubbled up too big. He protected the people around David from deadly, falling stars. They were beautiful but terrible. David's first laugh killed Mother. His father couldn't stop it or fix it. So he was lost to despair. He put David away somewhere he'd never again feel so much joy that the world would burn.

Luckily, the new place was empty and David's joy was rare until they built a sister and a new mother and father and had things once more to be joyful about. The joy was too much sometimes for Farukh and the power slipped out and the sky swirled a moment with color and his voice skipped around the room. But it didn't happen much. They barely burped up any butterflies, even for Amy. Because dogs have amazing capacities for happiness. So Farukh was a dog first to protect David from joy.

Finally Farukh plugged up the joy for good and they were safe, the world was safe. But then, joy having dimmed, David grew angry.

So Farukh became the World's Angriest Boy in the World. He became a little angrier every time David got a little mad. He skimmed anger off the top do it wouldn't go too far. An unfair game, a sister who ran faster, a teacher who mocked him. Farukh got angrier, his lines drawn sharp and dark. Because Farukh knew they couldn't control their powers yet, not when they were mad. They'd done a few things together, little magics. On purpose. Turned the color of the leaves early a few days. Brought a few ants back to life (if ever they were really dead, it was hard to say with ants. They weren't strong enough yet to sense the life of such tiny things). But angry was different. David's angry broke things. It burned them.

So Farukh became a boy of paper. David even Doodled him in the margins of notebooks sometimes. The Angry Boy who killed his mother with a knife. Or was it a fall of stars? No, no definitely knife. A boy couldn't make the stars fall on purpose just to kill his mother. Not on purpose and of course it was on purpose because how could a person possibly make the stars fall not on purpose? So must have been a knife. David and Farukh talked the first time then. Sort of. David doodled Farukh carrying out their conversations about stars and knives and mothers. It was the reason he got sent to counseling the first time. Disturbing images.

Farukh lost control more often now. A paper boy just doesn't swallow anger like a dog swallows joy. Anger burns inward when it can't burn out.

Because Farukh loved David more, he channeled all his being into mastering the flow of that elemental anger. At absorbing most but spinning off a constant thin stream of it so he didn't get overwhelmed. It didn't cause explosions but it did infect their new father with rage. It made sense. Angry boys are supposed to be the product of angry fathers, right? It hurt but made sense so it must be true.

And every time Farukh slipped, every time he let their power out just enough that a light bulb burst or a bully broke his leg on the football field, David believed for a second it was real. He believed and was afraid. He believed and remembered once he'd had so much joy he could reshape the earth and now he only had killing fires and the Angriest Boy. He grew very, very angry. The shrink said he was angry with himself. The fires he was setting, the drinking, and shoplifting. It was self hate.

They Were Wrong. It should have made David very angry. But he had Farukh to protect him from that. Farukh and the pills. Still, je tried to get so angry need be able to see the truth about himself and believe.

And yet, he was deeply afraid of his power, afraid of the harsh light of the stars that knew something he didn't, and of the part of him thinking up new ways to be angry so how could use the power that only came now with rage.

He immolated their house the last time his father hit him with a belt. David thought the blaze would kill him. And because he thought it would, it did. And for that first, terrifying time they died. And when they realized they were only dead because they thought it, they grew more afraid. It wasn't enough for Farukh to swallow the fear, it was much too big, it was sharp like knives. It wasn't just David. Farukh was afraid too. So he became it. And as he became it, David grew afraid of the very sight of him, afraid of acknowledging truth of what they were, afraid of eyes that burned yellow like fallen stars.

So Farukh hid from David. And he hid the memories of what they could do. Because when David remembered he grew afraid and when David was afraid Farukh grew. Farukh feared if he grew much more it would be David who couldn't contain him. Farukh was afraid if he broke David he'd break the whole world. Break out into that other world and then break that too. So Farukh began to let the memories slip out now and then, joy, rage, world creating-ending-creating powers.

The thoughts intruded on David's life. Just when he thought the meds were working and Farukh thought it could be safe to release the terrible pressure of truth. Something would slip, a flash of his house burning the leaves changing colors at their whim, and when they could see the present again, the fear had burst out of them and eviscerated a dove. David became afraid that it was all real and that it all wasn't. yhat he was insane or he was responsible for it all. Every ant, every breath, every star. And Farukh grew and grew.

The only thing that saved them, that saved the world, was Clockworks. They made a place outside of time. There, nothing was scary. There, nothing was anything.

The people had no stupid rules of time and space, no up or down.

It was easy. Farukh began to hope. Sometimes he let his guard down even. There were people here to help. They'd needed to retreat from reality to keep it safe. The people here got that.

They were safe. So Farukh didn't have to be a devil anymore. He could tuck the fear into the memories he'd spent years burying in layers of worlds David had written and forgotten. He became Lenny before David needed her. Just in case it was time. Just in case he'd finally earned what he'd sought for protecting them both for so long.

Then Syd came. And maybe Syd was real or maybe David made her because he knew the truth about Farukh already. It didn't matter.

Love was the only thing David had left, that never grew so big that Farukh had to swallow the extra. David didn't wait for it to grow. He gave it all to Syd.

Farukh screams and tries to win it back. It's all he ever wanted. It's why he was King first and not the shadow king. But he's not good for David. He's not funny, and defiant, and bright like Syd. He's not sane, not anymore. When he becomes Lenny, she's damaged and hot headed and delirious. They're so pilled up she can barely toss together a recognizable show of affection. She tries the drugs because they bring David a moment of peace. Like Syd. And she's heard drugs are supposed to have the same kind of chemical feel as falling in love. She drops them in his memory well before Syd. Lenny's love may be blue but it's older and truer than Syd's. Syd is nobody. Syd doesn't know that David's true laugh reshapes the universe. Syd's never choked that laugh so the universe can rest long enough to seem real.

David loves her anyway. Syd smiles, tells him he's special, and it grows.

Farukh knows it's his fault. Knows he swallowed down so much of David's will and self that David is simple as a child with his first dog, simple enough to fall in love over cherry pie and the thrill of a hand he can't touch as and who has suffered enough to seem real without seeming broken.

Farukh can't hold it all in. Lenny does her best. She learns to talk and walk in the world so she can try to save David from finding out if his love will destroy it. But she can't contain enough of David's love. Lenny is not good enough, not after plugging up joy, swallowing rage, becoming fear.

The power leaks out and rearranges Syd first. Her pathology becomes her power, her purpose becomes saving his life, loving him above all else. He gives her everything Farukh ever wanted. Everything Farukh shredded his soul for. It means war.

Love shattered Farukh, he couldn't hold it at all. And so all the rest started to leak out, all that swallowed, pilled up joy and anger and fear. It started to shape the stripped world back into dimensions and sense as it went. It was no longer shrunk to the safe, manageable size of a hospital. Being a clockmaker god had been easy. But this?

David began to become a person again. A mutant. Sane. Farukh threw his last will into stopping David from finding out how much more they were than that.

Syd had it easy. Syd had a place in the story by tradition. She was pretty and she would save him. Syd was love. She was spun of Amy and his mother and the light of stars that never fell, that just said, "David, wake up."

David made Syd to save him from Farukh. But who would save the world from David now that god was awake?


End file.
